"What happens when the copy thinks of itself as superior to the original? Appropriation of identity, the replication of social hierarchies, the hegemony of a particular race, gender, sexual orientation -- any one group over another, really -- this is what Magnus Robot Fighter is about.

"That’s the whole theme of appropriation again. H8R is a highly distorted representation of a certain kind of African-American speech; Magnus appropriates [Frederick] Douglass as an ahistorical referent to his own situation.

"...Robots can’t be authentic, all they can do is copy. It’s nearly impossible for them to come up with anything original on their own.

"White people are robots, that’s basically what I’m saying. Or is it?" -- Fred Van Lente

I was going to post more of this, but I think I want to encourage people to go check it out for themselves rather than totally spoil it all. Therefore, I'm just going to post this scene here because I love Bruce in it, even though it breaks my heart a bit.

So, passion versus will. That's what the Hulk ultimately boils down to in the end, and it's what Marvel tends to default to when they try to re-introduce the character to new audiences. It's when this dichotomy is at play that I generally find the Hulk the most enjoyable to read about (YMMV, of course), and so I clearly loved this story :-).

I've been on a bit of an Iron Man and Hulk blitz of late, and I've been catching up on a lot of trades and issues via my local library and local comic shop. The "Season One" series that Marvel has been publishing lately is a set of hardcover graphic novels that provide updated origin stories for their major characters.

Yeah, I know what you're thinking. "Again?"

I admit that I was a bit hesitant about picking this up, because it was a 100 page hardcover with a pretty hefty price, and it didn't seem like it was covering anything new. Then my library got it in, and I read it and then went out and bought it straight after, because dammit, I wanted my own copy, expense be damned. This is an awesome little story, which recounts the original Hulk origin with some nifty twists and shows a Bruce Banner who's damaged but resolute and brilliant.

HULK SMASH AVENGERS is a miniseries that shows the Hulk fighting the Avengers at various point in Marvel history. The final issue has the Red Hulk fighting the post-Civil War Mighty Avengers while Tony Stark and Bruce Banner talk things over.

While it may be slightly overshadowed this week by the release of a few other big-ticket comics, such as an issue of Avengers, Greg Pak, Fred Van Lente, and Ben Oliver have released a "point one" issue of their new run on Alpha Flight.

I have no strong opinions on Alpha Flight as a group, aside from when I was eight and an issue of John Byrne's run on the book scared the hell out of me (it was the one with a woman with a mouth for a face, if that means anything to you), but I flipped through this issue in the store based on Pak and Van Lente's names. I am now somewhat convinced that they A) read Scans Daily, and B) pander to it.

With last week's #11 concluding both Iron Man Legacy's Industrial Revolution arc and the series as a whole, I'm left disappointed it led with War of the Iron Men.

While that arc gave us rampant Starktech misuse, deft usage of nationalistic superhumans, and Gyrich catching Pepper using a Tony LMD in the worst way possible, it still wasn't as different as Industrial Revolution or as potentially interesting as the formerly next-up Arno Stark arc or the "Tony vs magic" mentioned in initial interviews.

And yes, Iron Man/Thor and that one What If take on that last one after a fashion, but I'd still have liked to see Legacy's take if not just for van Lente's ability to exploit a story concept pretty damn well as Industrial Revolution demonstrated.

I got drawn into it because it promised a down-and-out Circuits Maximus era Tony turning his talents to building another company for the purpose of revitalizing a neighborhood, in the process going head-to-head with the gutter neighborhood's secret masters- LA's own cabal of diverse villainy, the Pride.

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